Many athletes and non-athletes utilize weight lifting or weight training exercises to build strength and/or bulk, to prevent injury, or to improve overall condition and appearance. Typically, weight training exercises are performed with either exercise machines or free weights, i.e., barbells and weighted plates, dumbbells, etc. For various reasons, most exercise programs incorporate both machines and free weights in a variety of different exercise routines in order to maximize the effect of working out a desired number of muscle groups.
Free weights offer a number of advantages over exercise machines. For instance, they are relatively inexpensive in comparison to exercise machines. Free weights are also more versatile because a variety of exercises can be performed with one set of weights, whereas most exercise machines are designed for only one exercise. Even though some exercise machines accommodate more than one exercise, the cost of these machines usually increases proportionately with the number of exercises. Use of dumbbells also enables both arms to be exercised independently. Finally, free weights are popular among many weight lifters because the lifting movements are not restricted to prescribed planes of motion or prescribed angles.
Nevertheless, there are also a number of inherent disadvantages associated with free weights. One such disadvantage relates to safety. Although most weight room instructors strongly advise against an individual performing weight training exercises alone, this cautionary measure is particularly important when the lifting of free weights is involved. This is due to commonly recognized dangers such as the possibility of dropping a weight on a body part, or becoming trapped beneath a bar, which could easily occur in exercises such as bench press, incline press or squat. Additionally, through carelessness, loading and unloading of heavy weighted plates onto the ends of a bar sometimes results in an unbalanced bar that falls downward from a rack.
Another danger associated with some free weight exercises relates to the body positioning required to perform a prescribed maneuver. For instance, the most efficient way to perform an exercise referred to as a low row exercise is with a weighted barbell or dumbbells held in the hands, in front of the body, with the back bent and arms extended downwardly. The barbell is pulled upwardly toward the chest. This free weight, low row exercise is beneficial from a purely muscular viewpoint. However, it is also dangerous and/or awkward because of the position of the body with respect to the barbell during the exercise maneuver. The required bending of the back places the lower back muscles and the spine in a particularly vulnerable position during performance of this exercise in the described manner.
It might be said that the potential for injury from performing a low row exercise with free weights far outweighs the attainable muscular benefits. For this reason, many individuals simply do not perform this exercise.
Another disadvantage associated with this exercise relates to the fact that the weight resistance, or opposing force that is exercised against, is always directed vertically downward by gravity. This limits the manner in which the weight resistance may be applied to the low row muscle group during the prescribed muscular movement. The resistance acted against throughout the motion does not correlate in any way to the strength curve for the low row muscle group.
While the benefit of performing a free weight low row exercise may be questionable, it also seems that the relatively high cost of exercise machines has effectively diminished the incentive to design and develop an exercise machine dedicated solely to exercising the low row muscle group in an effective, injury-free manner. As a result, although many exercise machines do provide some tangential muscular benefit for the low row muscle group, none are designed specifically for the purpose of optimally isolating the low row muscle group to maximize muscular benefit.
It is an object of this invention to provide a low row exercise machine which simulates exercise with free weights but without the disadvantages normally associated therewith.
It is another object of this invention to provide an exercise machine which optimally isolates the low row muscle group to maximize muscular benefit during performance of a low row movement.